Tristan's Trivia

Monday, 13 February 2012

Well the day has arrived, true visual SQL is here, and all of us here at Microgen are very excited!

I'm pleased to announce the production launch of Microgen DBClarity Developer, and it's available to purchase now. Just go to the Microgen DBClarity site and follow the Buy Now links.

Whilst we developed the product to be database agnostic allowing you to graphically develop SQL queries and procedures for any supported database, we recognise that there are still plenty of organisations out there that run on a single database technology. As such, we've licensed DBClarity Developer so that you can choose which database platform you want to run on, hopefully making it a little more accessible to companies of all sizes. Of course, for those of you that run a heterogeneous database environment, you can buy the suite allowing you to run and deploy your queries and procedures on any database. After all, one of the product benefits in not having to learn or remember database specific syntax!

Thursday, 8 December 2011

Just to let you
all know that I’ll be hosting a free webinar on December 15th that will
demonstrate the capabilities of Microgen DBClarity Developer, and I’ll be discussing
how it can be used to overcome many of the challenges faced by reporting teams,
database developers, analysts and business insight professionals.

I'll touch on some of my past experiences managing Business Intelligence teams and involvement in large change programmes, and consider how DBClarity Developer would be beneficial in these situations.

I’ll be
including a Q&A session at the end, so if you have any questions about the
product or how it could be used to benefit your team, then this is a perfect
opportunity to throw them at me!

Wednesday, 7 December 2011

Firstly I’d
like to thank everyone who has provided us with feedback on the first beta of Microgen
DBClarity Developer. This is what I love
about, and where we see the real benefits of running beta programs, as you get to influence the things we need
to improve on.

So, we’re
almost there with Beta 2, and we’ll obviously be posting it up on the web site
for download as soon as it’s ready. If
you’re a Beta 1 user and have come to the end of your 30 day trial, don’t fret,
as the new beta will start your 30 days again.

So what have we
done?

·A
number of great improvements to the debugger, particularly for Teradata. The ability to visually debug and step
through stored procedures has got to be a bonus to any SQL developer!

Friday, 4 November 2011

I have just
read agreat blog post from George Coleman, the much respected Teradata engineer and
Set SQL guru, reflecting on the history of database programming culminating in the
Set SQL we all know and love today.

What I found
particularly interesting were the origins of programming with flowcharts, and
how this visual representation of process and logic is easy to understand and
remains an excellent way of documenting procedural systems. Obviously database programming has evolved into
a textual language, and enables us to fully exploit advances in RDBMS technologies
and massively parallel processing - rather fortunate given the significant increases
in data volumes and our unabated appetite for insight!

But wait, haven’t
we lost something along the way?

Database
programming, in the form of SQL, has become so advanced and so functionally rich
that is its use, beyond the basics at least, is now restricted to the realm of
us technical folk. So now those poor
business users and subject matter experts who could once work with a flowchart
to define and implement their requirements have to rely on the interpretation
of a developer to deliver their data needs, and then have no way of checking whether
the results reflect what they actually wanted.

So wouldn’t it
be great if we could somehow combine the power of Set SQL and the usability and
intuitiveness of a visual diagram. Not
only for basic data retrieval, but as a way of developing comprehensive
database procedures that can combine, transform, aggregate and analyse large
data sets. Just think of the increased
collaboration, accuracy and productivity gains that could be achieved with an
environment that can graphically generate complex Set SQL and deploy it straight
to the database.

Well, now this
is all possible - with Microgen DBClarity Developer. In Microgen's quest to simplify the complex
when it comes to developing enterprise applications, it saw the challenges normally
associated with the definition and implementation of business logic extend into
the data space. Exacerbated by the
growth in data volumes, with typical work around solutions like data
manipulation within Excel becoming unworkable, Microgen decided to tackle this
head on. Leveraging years of experience
crafting and refining a graphical environment for developing business processes and rules,
Microgen have created a completely graphical approach for developing Set SQL.

So as George
encourages you to migrate your old database code into Set SQL, why not simplify
the process and reduce your learning curve by taking the graphical approach. Give it a try at www.microgen.com/dbclarity

Tuesday, 25 October 2011

Some of you, particularly the
SQL gurus amongst you, may be asking why you need Microgen DBClarity Developer. So here are my thoughts.

I’ve lost track of the number
of programmes, projects and initiatives I’ve worked on, but consistent
throughout was a hunger for data to support the definition of requirements,
business processes, success criteria, ROI, etc.
I’ve seen Business Analysts spending too much of their time writing SQL
queries to get a better understanding of how a company’s product data is
structured, or how their customer hierarchies are modelled, only for another BA
to repeat the same process whilst on another project three months down the line. Development resources are typically stacked
trying to deliver the 50+ projects that are currently in-flight, and even if
they did have a small window to help, they need briefing, and then the logic
implemented need to be checked and validated.
It all takes valuable time.

I’ve seen BI teams, both
developers and analysts, writing endless SQL queries and procedures to support
the business’ need for insight – and that’s even when there is a full complement
of BI reporting and visualisation tools available. Indeed many large financial institutes have
many hundreds of people developing SQL queries on behalf of the business, all without
any real structure or control.

Then, to make matters worse, in
a typical enterprise that has many flavours of database, the poor business analyst
who’s just about become familiar with the Microsoft SQL syntax now has to go
interrogate some data on an Oracle or Teradata platform! I can hear the screams now… why does this
date function not work, why is this join different…

The scenarios are endless,
but take a step back and ask how many of these queries and procedures are
inconsistent, how many versions of the truth are being reported out there, how
many development briefs are misinterpreted and subsequent business decisions
made on invalid logic?

And this seems to be the
story wherever you go, whether on a large scale or pocketed away in small
teams, the fact is every company has some level of SQL development that is going
on in an inconsistent and uncontrolled manner.

So why Microgen DBClarity
Developer? Well we’ve addressed these and many other issues
by developing a product that enables the visual creation and maintenance of SQL
views, functions, triggers and procedures so that you don’t need to know
database specific SQL. A product that
has a repository with full version management and security so that you can
collaborate and gain control of your procedures, and one that I really love is
the ability to define SQL expressions (e.g. a KPI calculation) once and re-use them
across multiple queries. With a fully
featured visual debugger and features such as a “where used” report for impact
analysis, Microgen DBClarity Developer really is an enterprise level SQL
development tool.

So
next time you’re trying to explain to a business user what your 200 line SQL
query does, just think how much easier it would be talking through a visual
diagram.

Friday, 14 October 2011

Last week was a very exciting
one; not only was Microgen a gold sponsor at the Teradata Partners event in San
Diego, but we launched a beta release of our new product Microgen DBClarity
Developer.

It offers an innovative way
of developing SQL views and procedures through graphical representation. Designed to provide transparency and control
over in-database processes, and help bridge the gap between business and IT through
its visual environment.

We handed out many copies of a
trial version of our beta release at the Partners event, and you can now
download a 30-day trial version from the Microgen website. If you’d like to get a feel for the product first, why
not watch the introductory video at www.microgen.com/dbclarity

We have also posted a series
of tutorials on the website that help you get to grips with the product. They are based on the sample projects that
are shipped with the software, so you can follow each tutorial step by step,
and see the completed article in the sample project.

I’d love to get your thoughts
and feedback on the product and how you think it could help your organisation,
so please have a look and post your feedback.

Wednesday, 12 October 2011

After many years of
architecting, designing and developing business focused technology solutions, I
am really excited that I am now Product Manager for Microgen Aptitude. Microgen have a powerful technology platform
that enables organisations to develop enterprise class applications that can
leverage existing systems and data assets.I was particularly drawn to this role as I can see how the product could
have added huge value in past roles, and helped overcome a number of the
challenges we faced.

During my career I have been
fortunate enough to have been involved in both business and technology
transformation initiatives, and have seen first-hand the challenges faced by
organisations trying to respond quickly to changing market conditions.

From implementing SOA, sales
automation, legacy integration and migration programmes through to enterprise
wide adoption of agile methodologies, they all challenge us in the way we work
together, what technologies we use and how they integrate, and the end results
typically dictate significant change to business processes.

So it is with this in mind
that I get animated about Microgen Aptitude, my company’s flagship product. Microgen Aptitude provides an end-to-end visual
approach to application development that breaks down traditional barriers,
enabling true collaboration amongst business and IT folk.The platform includes all the technology
elements one needs to develop applications including BPM, business rules,
integration, ETL, and web applications. These
elements were designed from the ground up as a single integrated product, which
is based on a service orientated architecture with full orchestration
capabilities. This enables fast development
of enterprise scale solutions without the challenges of a mixed toolset with
proprietary languages (as is offered by some of the mega vendors).Finally, the Aptitude solution is resilient
and scalable and has the ability to process hundreds of millions of
transactions per hour. This all adds up
to a platform that happily powers applications at some of the world’s largest
investment banks and digital media providers.

In this blog, I hope to
discuss the challenges faced by companies today, and how they can rapidly develop
applications to gain competitive advantage, whether they’re to improve
operations, launch new products, or leverage existing data.